


Strawberry Fields (I'll Set Ablaze)

by zoeanne



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Gen, Vaxleth is mentioned twice, also my Grog isn't the best?, also!, but oh well, edgelord keyleth is featured prominently, i think he's more Travis than Grog tbh, implied self-harm!!!!, no descriptions but the implication is definitely there, nothing too extreme tho and they only actually interact a couple times, one of them is shippy-er than the other, possessed!Keyleth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-23
Updated: 2016-11-23
Packaged: 2018-09-01 16:11:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8630629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zoeanne/pseuds/zoeanne
Summary: A moment is playing on repeat in the fog before her and she can’t tear herself away from it. She sees herself in front of Raishan, sees vines shoot out and pin the bitch to the ground. Raishan thrashes and struggles but she can’t break free. She steps forward, eyes white and staff raised. She smiles.ORKeyleth holds herself back and pushes her feelings down until one day she can't anymore.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all! This is my first CR fic, and I had a blast writing it. It's part of the Critical Role Minibang and was inspired by the lovely artwork of katelyn-r-c.tumblr.com A big thanks to her for drawing the art that inspired this fic. Thanks to the cast for making this amazing show that honestly saved my life this summer. I don't know where I would be without this show and this fandom.
> 
> Trigger Warning for implied self-harm! It doesn't feature prominently in the plot and is only briefly mentioned (with no description) in one sentence about halfway through, so hopefully it isn't too bad.
> 
> Comments and criticism are always welcome! I want to be a better writer, and although I have watched every episode of CR to date, I really don't feel like a have a great grasp on the character's voices (especially Grog/Pike) and I would love any feedback on where I can improve them/my writing in general. My tumblr is babybyke.tumblr.com or you can just leave a comment below :)
> 
> Thanks again everyone, and I hope you like it!

A raven lands on her shoulder so Keyleth smiles and offers it a handful of berries. She often has dreams like this, just her and some animals, free and untethered and out in the wilderness. Alone. Happy. The bird ignores the berries. She frowns.

  
“They’re good berries,” She implores, popping one in her mouth. “See? Delicious.”

  
“I didn’t come here for the berries, my dear girl.” The bird says, mouth contorting to form the words.

  
And then she’s no longer standing in a field of wild grasses at sunset, she’s suspended in mid-air in the dark. And the raven on her shoulder isn’t a raven anymore, it’s a giant deer skull. Smoke swirls all around her, pouring out of the skull’s eyes and mouth, threatening to choke her.

  
“I came here for you, Keyleth of the air Ashari. It’s your turn,” The skull rasps. “I can help you. I can give you what you want, what you need.”

  
Keyleth scoffs.

  
“Oh, so you can save my friends and everyone I care for and bring back all my people from the dead? Try someone else, Orthax. I don’t make deals with demons.” She replies.

  
The skull grins, it’s bone structure cracking and crumbling, once again being replaced by a raven. The raven surges forward, gaining size until it’s 7 feet tall, and grabs her shoulders in its talons.

  
“We shall see, Keyelth. We shall see.” It caws and then it flies forward into the shadow.

  
As the raven carries her Keyleth sees a series of images flash by in the smoke. Clarota, writhing in agony as his form is torn apart by vines. Kynan, cowering on the ground as a huge mountain tiger tears at him with its claws. And Raishan, prone in the dirt as lightning comes down and strikes her, bolt after bolt, long after she stops moving. Smoke rises from her burnt corpse and the raven laughs.

  
“I have to say, I am impressed. Living with Percival as I did for all that time, I never once saw anything from you that would’ve suggested this kind of anger. But, I suppose all mortals have some level of anger in them. Yours is far more powerful than I ever could have imagined.” The raven tells Keyleth as it sets her down in front of the image of Raishan’s corpse.

  
“You’re wrong. I don’t have any of this inside of me. And no amount of images that you conjure up is going to change that about me. I am not like this. I am not like you.” Keyelth spits back through gritted teeth.

  
She has to admit, she is a bit pissed. She wasn’t naive enough to think that they had truly seen the last of Orthax, but she had at least hoped to have more than a 2 week reprieve. And after what it did to Percy, well she wouldn’t say no to seeing Orthax dead at her feet.

  
“There you go, Keyelth. Let it out. Let it take you over. Let your anger take control!” The raven implored from above her. “Tell me you don’t want this. Tell me you don’t want to see these people pay for what they did to you and to those you care about. Just say that you don’t harbor hatred in your heart, that it isn’t eating you up inside every day to be the good guy, and I will leave you alone.”

  
Keyleth is silent. She wants to say that she doesn’t, that she could never do any of these things because that’s not who she is. Wants to tell Orthax to go fuck himself for what he did to Percy. But she can’t stop staring at Raishan’s body. A moment is playing on repeat in the fog before her and she can’t tear herself away from it. She sees herself in front of Raishan, sees vines shoot out and pin the bitch to the ground. Raishan thrashes and struggles but she can’t break free. She steps forward, eyes white and staff raised. She smiles.

  
Keyleth feels sick. She squeezes her eyes shut and presses the palms of her hands against her ears, but she can still hear Kynan’s wimpers, Clarota’s shrill screams piercing her mind, and the image of Raishan’s still smoking body is projected on her eyelids. Her heart is racing and all she wants is for this nightmare to be over. But there is a small sliver in the back of her mind that wants Raishan to pay, wants Clarota and Kynan and everyone else who has ever hurt her to suffer and die. And that part of her is growing.

It started when she saw Raishan in that war room, and these images were only fueling her hatred.

  
“Come on Keyleth. I can help you. We can make her pay. All you have to do is say yes to this. All you have to do is say yes to the best deal of your life.” Orthax says.

  
His shadowy form wraps around her, constricting her and forcing her to watch as the tiger finally tears out Kynan’s throat. She watches as a huge mound of stone and earth crushes Clarota, leaving behind nothing but a crater and a smear of blood. She sees herself step forward and throw her hands out and vines wrap around Raishan’s body, pulling her in half. Keyleth sees herself shrouded in smoke, eyes pure white, step up and call down a huge ball of fire, reducing Raishan’s entire body to nothing but embers and ash. Hundreds of iterations of the same fight, the same death over and over again, each more brutal than the last.  
And then that little part of her isn’t so little anymore. It’s taking over, filling her with a sick joy at seeing the beast who killed a fourth of her civilization, a fourth of her fucking family, finally get what she deserves.

 

Then she’s awake. Back in Whitestone castle, slightly apart from the rest of her friends as they form a pile in the makeshift fort they made in Percy’s room. She’s shaking and she still feels nauseous, but she didn’t wake anyone else up, and that’s good. They need their sleep. Keyleth slowly leaves the fort and walks down the hall to the southern tower.

  
“You didn’t really think I wouldn’t notice if you left, did you darling?” Vex’s voice calls out from behind her.

Keyleth hangs her head and chuckles slightly.

  
“No, I guess I didn’t. You’ve always been the most perceptive out of all of us.” She admits.

  
“Yes, well, I have to keep an eye on my dumb-fuck brother, and he tends to try and sneak away from the group when he thinks no one’s looking.”

  
Keyleth hums in agreement. She knows what it’s like to try and keep an eye on Vax. A moment passes, both of them just watching the sunrise.

  
“It was nothing really, Vex. I just wanted some air. I’m an air Ashari, it’s kinda my thing.” Keyleth protests weakly.

  
“The fort is specifically for nightmares, Keyleth. The point is that you wake up and talk to one of us about whatever fucked up shit your subconscious decided to throw at you this time. You and Percy invented it, I figured you would at least attempt to stick to its rules,” Vex says. “And rule number one is no angsty alone time on the southern tower.”

  
“I thought the new rule number one was that there always needs to be at least one person between Vax and I?” Keyleth replies.

  
Vex wrinkles up her nose.

“God, Kiki, please. I do not need a reminder of what happened the last time we let you two sleep next to each other.”

Keyleth blushes and widens her eyes.

  
“I told you, we weren’t trying to have sex that time!” Keyleth squeaks.

  
“That time? What, so there were other times where you were trying to have sex?”

  
“What? No- No that’s- I wasn’t- Listen, we didn’t, I don’t even-”

  
Keyelth is stammering and her eyes are darting around the balcony and she wants to be gone. She’s such an idiot. Why would she bring up the Vax thing right now? She knows Vex hates talking about her brother’s relationship with her, and here she is bringing it up. And all Vex wanted to do was help her out after she had a nightmare and-

  
Vex puts an arm around Keyleth’s shoulders.

  
“Ah, sorry Keyelth. Calm down. I’m just kidding, ok? Just some harmless teasing between friends, alright?” Vex pauses, making sure Keyleth is really feeling better before she continues. “Besides, my brother is happier than he has been in a long time so I can’t really be mad about that, can I? Now, come on. Let’s get back to the others.”

  
“Thanks Vex.”

  
Keyleth gives Vex a smile and a hug and they walk back to the rest of Vox Machina, still sleeping in the fort in Percy’s bedroom. She lays down next to Percy and Pike, right in the center of the cuddle pile. She feels warm and safe.  
Except for a tiny piece of her, deep in her chest that is as cold and hard as stone, slowly growing and spreading its darkness through the rest of her.

 

The crow had been following Keyleth around all day. It’s the only bird in the area, and yeah, she’s used to attracting animals when she communes with the land, but there’s just something off about this crow. She’s staring at it blankly, spacing out as she attempts to understand what the trees are trying to convey to her, when she hears a voice whisper into her ear

“Good morning, Keyleth of the air Ashari.”

Keyleth’s head whips around, scanning the forest for the source of the voice she had heard. The voice laughs.

  
“I’m right here, Keyleth. Don’t you see me?”

  
Keyleth’s eyes land on the crow hopping through the snow towards her.

  
“Oh, uh, hi. Sorry, I just wasn’t really expecting to meet a talking crow today.” She manages.

  
“But we’ve met before, Keyleth. Don’t you recognize me?” The crow says as it cocks its head to the side and hops slightly closer.

  
Suddenly the bird sheds all its feathers and Keyleth is left staring at a floating deer skull.

  
“You’re welcome for the staff, by the way. Yenk is, or rather was, a close personal friend. It was rather easy to get him to come up here for a fight.”

  
Keyleth stands up and backs away from the skull.

  
“No, no, I didn’t say yes. I didn’t accept your offer. It was a dream and I felt sick and I didn’t say yes!”

  
The skull tilts to the side and scoffs.

  
“Oh, Keyleth, you didn’t have to say yes. You have hatred in your heart, you want revenge. All it takes is the feeling of it. It’s the glee you get at seeing your enemies fall at your feet, bleeding and suffering. Don’t you want to feel that?”

  
“No. No, I don’t. I didn’t- I’m a good person! I don’t want to hurt people.”

  
“Keyleth. There is no need to lie to me. I know you. I see you, I see all your thoughts and your desires and what you really want.”

  
Smoke pours out of the skull again, surrounding Keyleth and showing her an image of herself. She is yelling at Raishan, face red, eyes wild, telling her that she’s going to kill her, that she’s going to torture her and hurt her and make her suffer. And behind her she sees her friends, their faces ranging from slightly amused to outright disappointed.

  
“Face it, Keyleth. You have hatred in your heart. You have been letting the anger build up inside of yourself for years, refusing to acknowledge it or let it out, and now you’re going to burst. Let it out Keyleth. Don’t you want to?”

  
Orthax’s voice is no louder than a whisper but the sound of it presses against Keyleth’s ears and she feels like her eardrums are about to burst. She is at war with herself. Her head is telling her to shut this down right now, that she may have made a deal with Orthax unknowingly, but that doesn’t mean she has to follow through with it. Percy can help her find a loophole, just like they did with Artagan in the Feywild. But her heart is telling her something entirely different. In her heart she feels the pull to continue down this path. She wants to get revenge, god she wants to so badly, and though she doesn’t doubt that Vox Machina can kill Raishan eventually, it’s the eventually she has a problem with. It’s taking too damn long. She wants Raishan to pay now. She doesn’t want to give her any more time to find a way to escape her fate. Raishan doesn’t deserve any more time on this earth when the people of Pyra were not afforded the same courtesy.

  
And even if she does wait it out, gives the team time to plan, waits until Raishan is distracted by her conversation with Thordak’s spirit or whatever the fuck she wants to do after he is killed, there’s no guarantee that she would get to do it. Plans all fall apart in the heat of battle, and there is never any way to predict who will get to deliver the final blow. But dammit she wants it to be her. She’s had other dreams since the first night Orthax visited her, there’s no denying that. Brutal dreams. Dreams where she abandons her magic entirely, where she is stuck in some half Minxie, half Keyleth human-tiger hybrid and she is tearing out Raishan’s insides. Dreams where she is all human and so is Raishan and her hands are around Raishan’s neck and the life is draining out of the doomed dragon.

  
“What did you do to me? Is it some kind of curse, or spell, or-” Keyleth asks desperately. “There has to be some reason for this. Something you did.”

  
The skull laughs, the sound akin to the clatter of bones and the scrape of metal on metal.

  
“Silly girl. I haven’t done anything to you. I keep telling you that this was all inside you before I even appeared to you. Before Raishan, even,” The skull sneers. “Way back when in the Underdark, when a mindflayer betrayed you and your friends after you had fought so hard to get him to come with you and vouched for him so stoutly with the rest of your little group. Likely even before then. But I’m here to make it all better.”

  
Through the red haze of rage, Keyelth looks up at the skull. Her fists are clenched tightly and she is shaking, but she grits her teeth to speak.

  
“What do you mean? You can make me stop hating like this?” She grinds out.

  
“Of course I can. Once you get revenge on those who have wronged you this can all go away forever. All you have to do is kill a few people. 4 people, to be exact. Imagine that! Only 4! Percy and Ripley had 6 each. They had true hatred and anger inside of them. But you, you only have a 4 name list.”

  
“Only 4? Maybe that’s not so bad… And, and they all deserve it don’t they. Those bastards, they all fucking deserve it!”

  
Keyelth is all coiled muscle and trembling hands now. She can barely see what’s in front of her, but she can make out the image of herself threatening Raishan’s life swirling in the smoke before her. She smiles.  
“Yes. Yes, they fucking deserve it! I’ll make them pay!” Keyleth growls as she lunges forward at Raishan’s image in the smoke.

  
The skull vanishes, the smoke dissipates, and Keyleth passes out in the snow. When she wakes up the trees are worried about her but she can’t remember what she could’ve done to upset them so much. She decides she’s probably interpreting their shaking wrong and she leaves the clearing to get back to her friends.

 

For weeks afterwards, Keyleth feels off. Sometimes in battle she’ll get the urge to go earth elemental and get up in melee range with Grog, even when he has it handled or she knows she can do more damage with some well placed spells. Sometimes she finds herself in the foyer at Whitestone castle, completely unsure how she got there or even what time it is. Luckily, she’s always alone when those lapses happen. The last thing Vox Machina needs right now is to be worrying about her instead of the insane red dragon who wants them dead. Besides, she only loses a couple hours max as far as she can tell, and only at night when nothing important is going on. One night she wakes up with blood on her hands and nearly has another panic attack, her mind spiraling to a worst case scenario where she killed someone while sleepwalking, until she finds the word carved into her arm: Raishan. It terrifies and excites her to be this out of control, so she starts wearing long sleeves.

  
But she doesn’t tell anyone. Nothing can keep her and her friends from their mission, so she has to get it under control. She has to. So what if she has growing suspicion about where she goes at night, and it isn’t anything good? So what if she has to meditate for at least an hour after every fight to keep herself from going earth elemental and tearing Scanlan’s mansion apart with her bare hands? So what if she feels cold all the time no matter how many blankets she uses or how hot she makes her hands burn? So what if she hasn’t spoken to any of Vox Machina one on one in weeks except to argue about when to kill Raishan? Keyleth is fine.

 

And she manages to believe that for a few more days, right up until the day that Thordak sends a patrol of wyvern riders to stop them before they can reach Iman. As the riders descend upon them all Keyleth can think about is how the only person outside of Vox Machina who knew about their journey is fucking Raishan. She must have told Thordak. That’s the only way he could possibly know where and when to send his cronies. Her anger surges up and she goes earth elemental, shoving her way to the front of the fight and letting the haze of her rage take over.

  
In the end, she is holding one half of a wyvern in one rocky hand, and underneath her giant left foot is the crushed body of its rider. Three more riders lay at her feet, bodies crushed and spines snapped from the force of her impact. The captain of the patrol, or who she assumes was the captain from the way he was ordering around the other riders, is dangling from her fist, face contorting in pain and his hands pathetically scrabbling against her fingers. She watches the life drain from his face as she cuts off his airway and feels nothing.

  
Keyleth drops the captain’s body to the ground in disgust and turns away. Pathetic. They barely even put up a fight as she killed them. She transforms back into her human form, stalking behind a building to where the rest of the party stands and passing “Seeker Asum” on the way. It takes all of her self control not to slug her stupid fucking face right then and there. She feels a hand on her shoulder.  
“Uh, hey, Kiki. Everything alright?” Vax asks, his face betraying his worry.

  
“Yeah, Vax, everything's just peachy,” Keyleth snaps back, voice dripping with insincerity. “It’s the end of the fucking world, most of our allies are dead or will be soon, and a giant fuck all dragon somehow knows exactly where to find us, meaning someone told him where we were, and it was probably the bitch who killed a fourth of my people, but me personally? I’m doing great.”

  
She shrugs his hand off and goes to the back of the group, scowling. The rest of the party is silent. The only sound that can be heard is Keyleth’s footsteps as she stomps past Vax.

  
“You don’t really sound great… Are you sure-” He continues.

  
“Now is not the time, Vax! Now is not the time for my fucking issues when there are bigger problems! People are dying. They’re dying right now, and you’re wasting time asking me what’s wrong. What the fuck do you think is wrong!” She shouts back at him. “I can’t believe you. Let’s get a move on ok?”

  
“Oh, trouble in paradise? Such a pity to see young love spoiled like this. War can be tough on a relationship, why once I killed a young man who-” Raishan says mockingly.

  
Keyleth storms away once again, and the party hesitantly follows her. Her right arm burns again and she rubs at it. The word carved there, underneath her sleeve never really stops hurting and she traces the scars with her finger, just hard enough that it brings that pain to the forefront and centers her in the moment at hand. Her mind is clouded with so much black smoke that she can barely focus on anything except the fighting and she certainly isn’t in any kind of shape to be having some kind of heart to heart with boyfriend right now.

  
“You know he’s just holding you back, right? He wants to “protect you” and keep you from being your most powerful self.” Orthax whispers in her head.

  
“Oh, really? And what, you have my best interests at heart? You and I both know I’m just using you to kill Raishan and then we’re done. I’m not stupid enough to think you’re gonna do anything good for me.” Keyleth scoffs.  
“Of course. As you wish, Keyleth of the Air Ashari.” Orthax acknowledges before retreating further into her head.

  
Keyleth smirks. It always made her feel so powerful to push Orthax around like that. She was the one in control here, not him. She was making her own decisions and living by her own rules, Orthax was just a passenger. Sure, the nighttime blackouts persisted and had been steadily increasing, but Keyleth couldn’t be expected to keep her guard up while she was asleep, could she? He could only get her when she was at her weakest. Percy really made this out to be a much bigger problem that it was. What a weakling.

  
She was thrown out of her thoughts by the sound of flapping wings and screeches.

  
“More riders!” Vex shouts, aiming her bow overhead and firing furiously. “And a fucking pit fiend!”

  
“Wonderful. This is just what I’ve been waiting for.” Orthax cackles in Keyleth’s mind.

  
“Not now, Orthax. Shut up and go to wherever it is you go when I don’t need you.” Keyleth snaps back, dashing towards some cover to cast from.

  
“Oh, no, not this time Keyleth. This is it. The rest of them will be distracted, so I’m taking control now.” Orthax says, his voice overwhelmingly loud.

  
“What, no. What do you think you're doing?” Keyleth starts to say, thoughts trailing off as she feels a splitting headache overtake her and her eyes roll back in her head.

 

When she finally comes to she’s… taller? No, she’s just standing on something. Gods, it’s so hard to think. She raises a hand to her head to cast a quick cure spell and do something about her headache and when her hand comes into view she has to stop and take a second to make sure she’s seeing things properly. The name carved into her arm is a dark heavy black. It is pulsing, sending black through her veins and up her arm, disappearing underneath her shirt. The staff clutched in her fingers is surrounded in a similar black energy. It spirals outwards, forming the billowing clouds of black smoke and mist that signal Orthax’s presence.  
And then Keyleth finally looks down and sees what she’s standing on.

  
Raishan is spread eagle on the ground, wings, arms, and legs held to the ground by clumps of hard earth. She is bleeding profusely from various wounds across her body, and there are scorch marks indicative of fire and lightning damage as well. Her eyes are open, glaring up at Keyleth and snarling.

  
“Get it over with then, won’t you? It’s impolite to play with your food.” Raishan spits at her.

  
“Yes, Keyleth, finish her. She’s begging for it.” Orthax whispers in her ear.

  
She can see him now, he’s physically manifested right next to her, and his shadowy presence is overwhelming. Every second that passes makes her arm and head hurt worse and worse. Something is wrong with this moment. There’s something she’s missing.

  
“Where is everyone? Did we kill Thordak already?” Keyleth mumbles.

  
Raishan laughs.

  
“Foolish girl. You don’t even know the consequences of your actions, do you? Do you even understand the deal you’ve made?” She says, managing to sound superior even when she’s prone on the ground.

  
“What? No, I’m in control. I’ve got this.” Keyleth stammers.

  
“Oh, you idiot. You complete and total foo-” Raishan starts.

  
“Shut up!” Orthax commands.

  
He lifts his hand and Keyleth lifts hers, a bolt of lightning streaking down and cutting Raishan off mid-sentence. It felt good to do that, but Keyleth isn’t really sure why she did it. It doesn’t seem like something she would do.

  
“Where is everyone?” Keyelth asks again, slightly less confused this time.

  
She’s starting to get a very bad feeling about what is going on here and she needs it to not be true. Looking around again she finally spots her friends. They are standing around Raishan’s body, weapons drawn but not attacking. They look unsure and confused and very, very worried.

  
“Hey, Kiki, how are you feeling?” Vax calls out.

  
“Are you fucking serious, Vax? How are you feeling? What kind of- Honestly I don’t even know why I’m surprised.” Vex sighs.

“What happened? Did we kill Thordak?” Keyleth demands, even though she already knows the answer.

“Well, no. He sent a pit fiend after us, and you got a bit, uh, distracted...” Vax says, trailing off and eyeing Raishan on the ground.

“Ignore them, Keyleth. Now is your chance! Look at her, pathetic and weak and completely at your mercy. Kill her now before one of these imbeciles tries to stop you.”

  
Keyleth’s mind is clouded with anger and dark smoke and pain. Her headache is helping nothing, and this is the perfect chance to get her revenge.

  
“That’s right Keyleth, remember your priorities. This monster killed a fourth of your people. Shouldn’t she be punished for it?” Orthax coaxes in her ear.

  
His smoky form is wrapped around her and they lift their arms together.

  
“It would be so easy, and so, so satisfying. Do it Keyleth. Do it.” Orthax rasps.

  
The anger was taking over now and it was getting easier to focus on what she had to do. Just one more lightning strike, or even a well placed grasping vine, or maybe just a punch in earth elemental form, or-

  
“Listen to me Keyleth, you don’t want to do this. I know what it’s like to be Orthax’s puppet, how alone you can feel, how hard it can be to break free of his influence. But, this isn’t you! You’re not like me. You’re good, Keyleth.” Percy says pleadingly.

  
Keyleth feels the anger surge through her, moving up her spine and filling her head once more. Her eyes begin to glow white and the smoke around her billows out and spreads even further.

  
“No! I'm so fucking tired of that! I don't want be the good one anymore. I don't want be your damn moral compass when Pike’s not around! It’s exhausting and terrifying and stressful to be the “good one.” I have so much anger inside me Percy,” She shouts. “Anger and hatred and a need for revenge. It chokes me at night and it makes me feel helpless and powerful all at once. And I want nothing more than to let it all out. But I have to keep it all locked up inside me, so I can be the good one. So I can say “no, don’t do that, we’re not the kind of people who do that,” and keep you guys in line.”

  
Keyleth grits her teeth and clenches her fists even tighter, wrapping her hands around the Spire of Conflux and turning to face her friends.

  
“I don’t want to be the good guy anymore. I want to be angry and mean and fuck I want to kill something. And that something happens to be laying right here in front of me, asking me for death,” She says, gesturing helplessly at the dragon she’s standing on. “So I’m gonna do it, and I’m gonna kill this bitch and I’m going to avenge the deaths of my people!”

  
And then Grog punches her in the mouth. She falls backwards off of Raishan’s body, landing unsteadily on her feet, using the spire as support.

  
“What the fuck, Grog. Get out of my way!” Keyleth screams, moving towards Raishan again.

  
“No. You wanna rage? You wanna let your anger out on something? Fucking do it then. Fight me.” Grog says, standing firm in front of her.

  
“Keyleth, he is weak. He is a distraction. Do not let him deter you from your prize.” Orthax commands.

  
But Keyleth doesn’t hear him through her rage. How dare Grog? How dare he keep her from her goal. She deserves this. Raishan deserves this. Who the fuck does Grog think he is to stand in her way? With a scream she lunges at him. In a blind rage she drops her staff, leaving her magic behind and transforming into an earth elemental. She needs to hit something with her fucking fists right now.

  
He blocks some of her hits, and lands some in return, but she can feel him holding back, pulling his punches and letting her land the ones she does.

  
“Don’t treat me like I’m going to break! Fucking hit me!” She screams in frustration.

  
Of course, it comes out as the sound of a rockslide, but her harder tackles and dirtier blows send a clear message. Soon Grog is hitting her full force, chipping pieces of her body off as quickly as she is reforming them. It feels good to get hit and even better to hit back, but in the back of her mind Orthax is still there, yelling at her to get back to her goal.

  
“You fool! She’s getting away! Complete the list! Complete the list!” Orthax shouts.

  
She looks up from the fight to see Raishan, free of her bonds and flying away. The rest of Vox Machina distracted, running through the smoke and fighting Orthax. A punch sends her flying again and she reverts to her human form.

  
“No! No, no, no! I was so close!” Keyleth shouts. “Dammit!”

  
“Useless, foolish, weak, little girl. If you can’t give me what I want, I’ll have to take it!” Orthax says as he dives out of the smoke towards her.

  
Her arm starts to burn again, more than it ever has before. Wisps of black drift out of it towards Orthax’s body, followed closely by wisps of green and brown and white. Keyleth feels herself getting weak and tired and she falls to her knees. Vox Machina rushes forward, hitting Orthax with everything they’ve got. They quickly whittle him down, and Percy delivers the final blow, a blast of psychic energy from his fancy new gun dissipating Orthax’s form as he roars in fury. Keyleth slumps forward, exhausted. For the first time in weeks she feels warm, but the anger that had been fueling her remains, and the knowledge that Raishan is out there somewhere still makes her want to scream and punch something.

  
“How are you-” Vax starts to say.

  
“Vax, if you fucking finish that sentence I will kill you.” Vex says, cutting him off.

  
Keyleth looks at Vox Machina, at her family, and she is at a loss for words. She wants to apologize for fucking the plan up, she wants to apologize for being weak enough that Orthax could get to her, for being arrogant enough to think that she could possibly be controlling him, for being naive enough to think that her revenge wouldn’t affect the others. She feels a large hand on her shoulder and turns to see Grog’s bruised face looking down at her.

  
“Oh, gods, Grog, I’m so sorry! I was just so angry, and then you-” She stammers.

  
“I get it, Keyleth. I understand being angry. I know what it’s like to have it take control of you. I understand. Sometimes it’s so fucking powerful that you feel like you’re on top of the world and crushed under it at the same time,” Grog says. “But, even though it can seem like something toxic and dangerous, you’ve gotta acknowledge it and let it out. If you don’t, well, I guess you know what can happen, huh?”

  
“Yes, I know now, and I’m really sorry, and I won’t let it-” Keyleth rushes to say.

  
“Keyleth. Shut up. I’m trying to give a big heroic speech here.” Grog reprimands.

  
“Oh, uh, ok. Go on.”

  
“Well shit. I forgot what the fuck I was saying. Damn. Well, anyway, if you ever need to let your anger out, I’m here as your sparring buddy. Oh, and Pike always tells me to think of happy shit if I get too mad. So, next time just think about an endless river of ale and I’m sure you’ll be just fine.”

  
Keyleth sighs and gives Grog a hug.

  
“Thanks, buddy.”

  
“And we’re here for you too, Keyleth. All of us,” Scanlan says. “And I promise that after we take care of the big red fucker who destroyed our home, we will finally take a damn break.”


End file.
